guast

Sorry if I missed something but why do you regret your marriage. What I hear is that it sounds like both of you had some concerns or reservations about getting married (not incredibly unusual), got married, which was great, and then (and including?) 11 years later you're not happy. Eleven years is a LONG time... what exactly happened between "great" and "unhappy" to get you from point A to point B? A lot of advice here but I think it's hard for people to give you specific advice when you haven't explained (unless I missed it reading through this) what exactly why you are unhappy. I'm going jump to the conclusion that your unhappiness in marriage has very little to do with having some reservations about getting married a decade earlier (unless those reservations are rooted in a continuing or still-existing problem that you haven't shared). So... what is it specifically that you're not happy about with your marriage now?

All I gotta say is that even though I don't know you I can already tell that I like you :). Wikipedia has a pretty good description of Sheldon too: "Sheldon is a Caltech theoretical physicist... [who] exhibits a strict adherence to routine, a total lack of social skills, a tenuous understanding of irony, sarcasm, and humor, and a general lack of humility or empathy. He is vocal about his own superior intellect compared to those around him." I had a roommate like that years ago and quirkiness was a large part of what made him so much fun to hang out with.

No you didn't offend me at all :). You brought up an excellent point and I agree with everything you said - I just wanted to clarify my comments so that no one misinterpreted what I was saying. I appreciate what you said and I'm glad you pointed it out. Sometimes I assume what I write is clear but it's good to have a second set of eyes to catch how others might misunderstand what I write. Thank you for your comments!

Wow. You really ARE Sheldon! Your responses make so much more sense now that I have context.

I think you've stated it very well. I was addressing more the opportunity for that status to change at some point for a person who is faithful than suggesting that there is a work-around to avoiding the requirement. How that opportunity will present itself is outside of my scope of understanding but I believe it will exist for anyone who is faithful and doing the best he or she can in this life to be obedient.

Maybe we're just saying the same thing in different ways. I don't disagree with anything you've said above. My only point was that a person marrying outside of the faith in this life does not in itself guarantee that the person has lost the opportunity for exaltation in the next life. If a person were to reject that in this life and in the next then I agree with that you that the consequences are what they are. But I don't think any of us are in the position to make a determination of when that rejection takes place. All of us make mistakes and I don't believe that a mistake, such as marrying outside the church, made at a young age by a person who does everything in his or her power to abide by the gospel for the remainder of life will be used simply to punish the person for eternity.

Let me back up - I am not disagreeing that the sealing power is necessary for exaltation. No issue with that. But there is a lot that happens between sealing or not sealing in this life and exaltation and we do not know what happens in the next life between death and exaltation. I'm fine with you saying that it's doctrine that sealing in necessary for exaltation but what I'm not fine with is you asserting and what is absolutely not doctrine is that if a person marries outside of the church for whatever reason they are damned for that decision. You do not know what happens between death and exaltation or how things shake out. I understand that you want to make the leap that if you are not sealed in this life because you did not marry in the temple when you had the chance then tough luck, it's over. I get the tendency to want to convert the steps we understand as necessary into a standard for condemnation of all those who we perceive as having "blown his or her chance." It's not our place to decide and it's not our place to condemn. You have no more right to decide a person has lost opportunity for exaltation than I do to decide when a person has rejected the gospel and has blown their chance to accept it. That is what you are doing in your friends who have married outside of the church have no shot at exaltation unless their spouse joins in this life. That's not your decision and, honestly, none of your business. Not only does your scenario condemn those who are members who marry outside of the church but also those who are married and then join the church only to have a spouse that never does. How is that fair?? Have you noticed that the church authorities have never advocated that a person who married outside the church and is faithful divorce their spouse and try to marry someone else who is in the church or be forever lost? Why is that? Is it because the General Authorities have simply chalked those people up as being lost and too bad, they've given up their one shot? Of course not. That's ridiculous. There is a lot that will be worked out in the next life - I'm not claiming to know how it works out but I am certain that God is not there to tick off a singular mistake an otherwise faithful person has made and moved on from and condemn them for it. But this absolutism attitude of "you're lost because..." is myopic and contrary to everything the gospel teaches about the ability to move past any mistake and to have hope no matter what wrongs we are trying to correct.

I think I'm seeing where the ability-to-communicate problem lies. I believe this is when you're supposed to point out that fault lies with everyone else for EVERYONE misunderstanding what you so obviously meant.

I've read it somewhere and don't have the time to look it up but more importantly I've had a deeply personal experience that tells me that that absolutism approach you present is wrong (and I can appreciate where you are coming from - I've believed that too in the past). I don't know how things shake out on the other side but I do know it isn't as simplistic as damning anyone who makes a mistake early in their life and spends the whole of their life living the gospel and being faithful. The scenario you present creates an unforgiveable sin based not only on the part of the person who marries out of the church but makes the salvation of that person contingent on whether another person eventually joins the church. And creates, as I stated, a loophole for punishment, in which a person who commits all sorts of vile sins can repent, marry in the temple and receive all of the blessings while a person who has made every good choice in her life except for marrying outside the temple at an early age will be cut off from receiving all of the blessings in the next life. Not only is that insanely absurd but it cuts against all of our doctrine of a fair and loving God. Spending time determining what a person is going to be damned for in the next life is a poor focus of our energies in my opinion. What I have been taught repeatedly is that there is NO mistake, NO sin (with the exception of denying the holy ghost and maybe murder) that a person cannot completely come back from, and complete forgiveness means absolute entitlement to all blessings and exaltation. Anything short of that is not complete forgiveness. To say "you can repent but you lose this eternal blessing because you messed up" damns the vast majority of everyone in the church.

Moving on... To the OP - sorry about this silly, distracting side conversation. Back to your question now.

@Volt - I'd be happy to explain what I'm not tracking but drop the defensive and condescending attitude first. I'm not interested in discussing anything on this forum with someone who can't discuss something wiithout being patronizing in the response. If there was something I said that offended you I apologize. I'm not interested in picking a fight with some random person on the internet, particularly on this forum. I responded to your comment and when you said I was misunderstanding what you said I asked you to clarify. That's the end of it.

I'm stuck with what you type. If I'm misconstruing what seems pretty straight-forward to me, feel free to correct my understanding of what you typed. Saying I'm giving false meaning and leaving it at that doesn't get us there. Ehh... what? I'm really confused right now. What are you talking about? See below. If that isn't what you're saying please clarify.

Without trying to step on toes there's a misunderstanding about the point of what was being discussed. Yes, a person has to be sealed to be exalted. No one is disputing that. BUT to say that if a person has married outside of the church and then struggles and tries to be faithful in every way it is absolutely ABSURD to say that a person has lost all chance of exaltation in the next life because at 23 or whatever he or she married outside of the church. That would be to suggest that a person can live a life of decadence and wickedness and repent of all of that in their 60's but the person who married outside of the church in her twenties or thirties be d-mned because of that singular choice. I don't know how it all shakes out but I know this guaranteed exclusion for exaltation for marrying outside of the church is just not true. If a person does believe that someone will never have a shot at exaltation in the next life for marrying outside of the faith then that person's found the loophole unforgiveable sin that has by some miraculous measure slipped by every general authority. And for what it's worth, as a personal matter, I don't for a second believe that God would divide between wicked and righteous (or exaltation and non-exaltation for that matter) two people who have both married out of the church and were faithful to the end but one of which had the good fortune to have her spouse eventually join the church while the other did not. There's nothing fair or merciful about that.

For what it's worth I've been single for some time and have dated quite a bit both in and out of the church. One of my more serious relationships was to this awesome girl who was in many ways pretty much a member but had no interest in joining. Maybe she will at some point but it's a pretty brazen assumption to jump into marriage on the belief that she definitely would join. After dating for a couple years and being at the point where we were looking at marriage. At that point I started thinking about what I wanted in a relationship (yeah, I should have figured this out a long time before, I know...) and I started to struggle with the realization that some of the most important things in my life I would never be able to fully share with this person. It was awesome that we both liked rock climbing and that we loved hiking but I started to wonder if it would be as fulfilling to me as I wanted in quieter parts of my heart. I very likely would never be able to share with her experiences I had at church or what I'd felt in the powerful moments that change a person's life. Sure, I could "share" in the sense I can say "this is what means so much to me" and she was would be polite and listen but I might as well be describing bouncing across the surface of Mars. Another issue is what happens if/when you have kids. I have relatives married to non-members or less active who trek their kids to church every Sunday alone and sit through church every Sunday alone in the BEST case scenario (spouses who aren't critical but want nothing to do with the church). It's not an easy thing. And it's hard to teach the kids about the importance of going to church when you have a parent who wants nothing to do with going. Some who have gone through this are fine with it and take it as part of the territory. I had the advantage, as do you, of being able to make that decision ahead of time. For me I decided that I would rather be alone for my life than marry outside of the church - it's too important to me to not be able to share it with the person I am with. There is absolutely no criticism in what I say of anyone who chooses to do things differently; this was my choice and I'll take whatever consequences come with it. But I think those considerations I mentioned are real and should be thought through no matter what decision you finally come to. What is important is different for everyone but don't assume that someone will join the church down the road and don't give up what is important to you for something less simply because it's easier to take the lesser portion.

Have to strongly disagree with this. Not sure what your relationship history has been but I know that is definitely untrue for everyone. Maybe you won't every have that kind of love for someone in this life but it's unfair to so casually dismiss the depth of other people's love by assuming because you can't feel others clearly are incapable of those feelings as well. Wanting to be with someone for all of time and eternity does not turn on someone else's perfection or our own. Saying that if we aren't perfect we couldn't want to be with someone for all eternity or someone want to be with us is on par with saying that if a love isn't complete and perfect it isn't really love. Just because love can grow and deepen doesn't make it any less real or any less meaningful. Desire to be with someone eternally is part and parcel with that and the fact it will grow and deepen doesn't make it any less real.

Great advice and I do completely agree that getting frustrated with the situation may end up costing the person more than imaginable. I read an article a couple years ago by an LDS woman who was single and frustrated by being older (30's) and single so she gave up on the church and went off to "hook up" with non-members in an attempt to assuage the loneliness of being single. I always thought that was such as sad and potentially eternal decision, despite completely understanding that situation myself and knowing how deeply that loneliness runs (having been single into my 30's myself and having plenty of opportunities to hook up with non-members). The whole giving up thing reminds me of the stories I read of the people in the holocaust camps who would kill themselves, some by throwing themselves against the electric fences, because they could bear the suffering no more, only for the camp to be liberated a few days later. Maybe a single person will be single until the day he or she dies. Maybe not. Who knows. But getting frustrated can lead a person away from the gospel and then you end up with the only guarantee you can have: the very chance of finding the person you want to be with is gone.

Okay, seems I need to provide some clarification to what I've said because at least the poster above seems to think they are subject to gross misinterpretation. I am not at all advocating, and never would, delaying the repentance process and as I have repeatedly stated in my previous posts, the OP needs to get into to see the bishop immediately rather than worrying about what someone else is discussing with her bishop. If I were to say that a person can repent after years of sinning, despite being raised in the church, then what I would be saying is absolutely true and doctrinally correct BUT it would be completely inaccurate and inappropriate to misconstrue that statement as my advocating that a person go out and live a wild life, sinning however he chooses and then plan on repenting at some point down the road when he's gotten the "fun" out of his system. The OP's statements have not been directed at all to the issue of whether he needs to talk to the bishop but rather a "concern" about his ex's status with the church if she were to lie about her worthiness and go through the temple unworthily. My point was simply this - there isn't much a person can do that he or she can't come back from and even lying about worthiness, failing to tell the bishop until years later, doesn't mean that she is lost or that punishment will be heaped on her tenfold if she does decide to repent. Each person is accorded the efforts he or she makes to correct the wrongs he or she makes. That being said, I would never advocate holding off repentance or lying about worthiness. But this thread isn't the ex-girlfriend asking what she should do; this is the thread of the boyfriend asking what he should do about her decisions and my response is and has been "let her make her own decisions and if she does wrong and wants to correct it, even down the road, it isn't too late - but it isn't the OP's decision how she proceeds."

I know this probably doesn't mean much from a complete stranger over the internet (so take it for what it's worth :)) but for what little I know about the gospel I am certain both from what I believe about God and from a deeply personal experience in my life that a person's exaltation does not turn on one singular choice of marrying outside the church. If it did then I'm in really bad shape because I've made much worse decisions than that. I am convinced that exaltation has so much more to do with how we live our lives and our faithfulness to the gospel and that is for most people a process that takes all of this lifetime. I struggle with hope myself, measuring the wrongs I have done against what I'm certain I've given up as a result of poor choices and the weaknesses within me. But everything I see in the gospel is that there is a God with perfect foresight into every mistake a person can make and who, with this perfect foresight, has made it possible for anyone to get back home (ie, exaltation), regardless of what poor choices that person has made (with the exception of a couple unforgivable offenses that are irrelevant here).

I'm going to throw one more thought into this - if a person commits an offense than probably warrants excommunication or disfellowship but never reports it and years go by and the person doesn't repeat the offense and lives a faithful life then the fact the person never reported it and went through a counsel is not waived in in his/her face and held against him/her. The years of abandonment of the sin and living faithful may evidence complete repentance and make any sort of excommunication, disfellowship, or even church counsel unnecessary. No question it's better to handle these sorts of things up front but the point being the gospel is more focused on saving souls who repent than setting traps to send them to hell. Each person's ability to appreciate repentance and to complete that process differs. Again, the point is don't use "trying to save her" or "protect her fiance and his family" as an excuse for meddling in her life, which no longer includes you. And I do agree with the other comments that you are misinterpreting/misapplying The Miracle of Forgiveness to your situation.

I've already posted on the other lengthy thread of yours on this subject (http://www.lds.net/forums/advice-board/45428-do-i-tell-her-bishop-stop-her-temple-wedding.html) but you seem more concerned about finding someone to validate what YOU want to do than listening to what others have repeatedly told you, which is MOVE ON AND LEAVER HER BE. You are more concerned with her "covering this up and possibly hurting a good family" than you are about going to your bishop?? Do you not see the problem with that statement. This has NOTHING to do with repentance or worrying about the family - if it did you would have RUN to see your bishop... but you haven't. You just keep talking about it in the context of being more concerned about letting her bishop know about her wrongdoings. You'll other thread is basically titled, "should I try and stop her from getting married" not "what are my obligations to her in MY repentance process?" That alone should tell you that you're motive are so much less pure than you make them out to be. To be blunt (and hopefully not offend you) you need to be more mature, let go of her and move on with your life. She is responsible for hers and you are responsible for yours. She doesn't want you anymore. I'm sorry, that sucks, I've been through it but it isn't your place to try to control her life (remember Sunday School - that's how the devil operates) or to manipulate the gospel to try and thwart her marriage while still being able to feel okay about what you are doing. I've been through exactly what you've described and I get the pain that comes with it but trying to justify jumping into someone else's wedding bed and getting between then under the guise of trying to help the relationship be honest isn't correcting the wrongs you've already made but compounding them by trying to manipulate her new relationship because she isn't with you anymore. The very fact that you're considering calling his mom to tell her shows how completely detached this whole line of thinking is from any sort of genuine altruism or love. On a different note, don't you have any faith that God can handle things on his own? You are essentially saying you don't have any trust in the Bishop's interview process in the eternal context (as though God didn't know people wouldn't be entirely honest at times in temple interviews and somehow didn't factor that into the program) or that God is setting traps for people who aren't 100% honest in interviews and they will burn if you don't save them?? Grow up and move on. Its' the right thing to do.

I think there are some categories of things a person should ALWAYS share with a potential spouse. STD's, children out-of-wedlock, incarceration for homicide, yup I think all of this things fall under the mandatory disclosures up front so that it isn't an issue down the road.

I have no disagreement about the first part of what you say EXCEPT where you get into having too many expectations. Those expectations derive directly out of the doctrine that we are taught by the general authorities and concern what will happen in the next life. The teachings aren't "get sealed, period" the teachings are "get sealed so that in the next life we can be together with the person we are sealed to for all eternity." I'm fine with the "don't have expectations in the next life" but then I'm back to the, I don't know what is going to happen in the next life so why bother getting sealed, I'll get married and whatever happens in the next life, happens. If the response to the attitude is, we are taught that we can't be sealed to our families in the next life if we aren't sealed here then my response is, well, what I'm hearing from everyone is that we don't even know if we'll be sealed to our families in the next life anyway and WHO KNOWS what will happen there. And back to why bother worrying about the next life, why bother getting sealed. I think sometimes that what we want in the next life is not what we as individuals want but we want what we do because we are SUPPPOSED to want those things. If that's the case, then I'm in serious trouble in the next life :). As a general matte I don't disagree with these statements and I think it's important to be committed to who you marry. But I've found the nature of the relationship affects my feelings towards it. If I'm casually dating someone I'm going to approach it very different than when I am engaged to someone. Likewise, if I'm married to someone and it's for time I will commit all of myself to that person for this life but I will always know in the back of my mind that when the ride ends, I get off. I don't see how a person could ignore the HUGE difference between being with a person for life vs for all eternity. Maybe that's not significant to some but for someone who has been in very lengthy and serious relationships that have ended for various reasons abruptly it is difficult for me to look at a forthcoming relationship with any sort of "this will last for ever if both are committed" when in all likelihood that just isn't true. Even the gospel can't promise that to two people who want that because as I'm hearing "who knows what happens in the next life." So I can happily give all of myself to another person for this life with a nice civil ceremony but if the sealings can promise nothing then I will assume it ends at death and worry about the next life in the next life.

My doctrinal understanding of this is different. I don't believe there is any requirement of sealing to get in the celestial kingdom. President Kimball said (in my two-second search) in general conference "Even unmarried, we may reach the celestial kingdom..." (though there are limitations on the unmarried but they are still in the celestial kingdom).

Without getting too much into the whole family thing as opposed to the question of sealing between spouses let me just say this: I come from a broken family. Both parents remarried after the divorce, mom and step-dad active while dad is not and step-mom is non-member. A broken family is what it is: broken. I love my family but I don't want to be sealed to my step-dad (he's not my father) as much as I appreciate him and as good of a person as he is. I don't want to be sealed between two couples. I have nothing against the idea of "families forever" but once I figure out how to cancel the sealing that took place between me and my parents that's my next project (and I don't want to give the impression that I have abusive parents, cold, unloving parents or anything like that - I just want nothing to do with an eternal broken family. I'm very familiar with the Abrahamic covenant. I'm not really sure how to state this without sounding cynical but I feel like if I want the blessings of the Abrahamic covenant it is because I'm supposed to want them, not because I really do want them. It just isn't something I wake up in the morning thinking, man if I'm righteous than I can have... There are many things that I like the idea of but at best I just don't really have an opinion on the Abrahamic covenant. I'm not apostate, I swear *smile*, it's more of an issue that I go down the route of I do right because I believe it is right, not because I anticipate great mansions or lots of kids or whatever in the future. And if I don't desire after something, I don't and certainly not simply because I'm supposed to.

I guess I don't know a whole lot about how things are going to shake out in the next life and there's a lot I really don't care to speculate about but here's my question, so far as it relates to marriage and sealings: why bother? I grew up under the impression that "families are forever," and got a little teary-eyed when Elder Bednar talked about, in his tender mercies talk, the widow receiving the note from her recently deceased husband about how families can be together forever. But... Some of the things I'm learning about doctrine (?) make me think that my perspective that if I am sealed in the temple and I am faithful and my spouse is faithful that we will have an eternal marriage is incredibly myopic and seemingly childish. Here's what I've found: 1. After a husband and wife die and wife can be sealed to ALL of the husbands she was married to - presumably (as some on this board have speculated) so she can chose who she REALLY wants to be married with. 2. After a spouse dies (and I know it doesn't happen frequently but if I am to believe what I'm told it does happen) the living spouse can have the sealing cancelled so that he/she can be sealed to someone else. I know there are no guarantees in marriage, life or anything. A spouse can cheat on you or divorce you -- but at least in those situations I'm there and whether or not I can control it I can at least be there to know it wasn't simply my uncontrollable absence that caused a spouse to up and cancel a temple sealing or simply decide someone was a bit better than what I had to offer. Ground rules: I'm only talking about situations where spouses are both living faithfully to the gospel. I have no issue at all with someone who had a deadbeat, unfaithful or abusive spouse wanting to get sealed to someone who treated him or her better. No issue there and so let's skip the "everyone deserves a faithful spouse and some spouses leave the church, etc" speech. The second part of this is that I'm not really interested in discussing what will or won't happen in the next life, whether it is polygamy or whether we are all living in a nudist, hippie colony or whatever crazy ideas people have because it is nothing more than speculation and we're not going to have answers to in this life. If I'm not concerned about speculating about the next life then why the question, right? Because the sealing is in this life and my understanding of it and the answer to "why bother" affects whether I do or not and what of myself I give to a marriage. To be blunt, this, for me, goes much further than simply "obey or not obey"; I've been in some relationships that have ended in devastating ways and it affects how much of myself I will give to another. And the degree to which relationship has the possibility to exist affects how much I will give. A one-night stand (don't worry - just an example, not a lifestyle choice for me) would require very little commitment and it can be purely selfish. A til-death marriage is a nice, little vacation that you share with another person before you go your separate ways and if you outlive the other person you may or may not (as your discretion) replace the person with someone else to continue the remainder of your vacation in this life with. A temple sealing is something that you give ALL of yourself to and "cleave" to the other person because it is forever and your investment can yield greater than your whole self. But why would I invest ALL of myself in something that "may" last forever... but may not (assuming again that both parties are faithful)? Some people have no problem with that and the risk is something they are willing to accept because, hey, it might turn out awesome in the end. Hopefully. But I do not have enough of myself left to invest in the risky proposition of, say, I die early and she decides to proceed to temple sealing number two or whatever the case. It seems at that point easier to simply do the "til death do you part" and worry about the next life in the next life and not have to worry about investing in something that may not last more than this brief flicker of a life anyway, despite a person's best efforts.